One idea about going beyond annoying leftist academic vocabulary to get to the world we need to build for ourselves. The OP posits that solarpunk is a way forward.
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One idea about going beyond annoying leftist academic vocabulary to get to the world we need to build for ourselves. The OP posits that solarpunk is a way forward.
Our resistance is a two-pronged approach. As we fight back against fascist repression to protect ourselves and our communities, we absolutely must start to envision what to replace the current regime with. It’s no good to wish for “a return to normalcy”—that “normal” is what got us here in the first place. Don’t let what is get in the way of what could or should be. Think past capitalism. Think past liberal vs. conservative, Democrat vs. Republican. Get past the fear of envisioning something you believe others are going to ridicule you for. That’s just exposing how unimaginative others have been conditioned, indoctrinated to become.
And when you share your vision, you may very well find out that you are not alone. Sure, facing off against the American Gestapo requires courage. Envisioning and sharing that vision also takes courage and conviction. And you don’t need to have all the answers. No one person has them. But together we just might.
Reject any demand to justify what that vision is with all these “What about…?” and “What would happen if…?” questions, anything in the spirit of bad faith. Anything that demands that you have it all figured out. It’s not one person’s task. Instead, deflect those bad-faith questions with questions of your own. You turn the tables on them and do the interrogation yourself.
Ask them why they believe as they do. Ask them for the answers on how capitalism/the status quo is going to solve our problems. Ask them if they think that what’s currently going on is normal. Ask them why they feel the need to cling to this sense of normalcy. Ask them if it’s okay to normalize this sort of repression and law-flouting. Get the dialogue going. This is how to struggle with people. It’s called Material Dialectics, now demystified.
@louisamunchtheory on Insta
Like this person says, an “AI-fied” world is NOT inevitable. “If there’s been a way to build it, there’ll be a way to destroy it/Things are not all that out of [our] control” -Stereolab, “Crest”
Don’t be a Dystopian Dave. The fall of the US empire isn’t our doom. It’s our chance to make a clean break with these systems of oppression and tyranny: the surveillance state, hypermilitarization, corporate control, state and corporate violence, wealth inequality, labor and housing precariousness, racialization and marginalization of large groups of people, Calvinist Christian Identitarianism aka Christofascism aka White Christian Nationalism, white narcissism, white rootlessness, and so on. What will we create when we do finally get ourselves free?
Thinking about the future reshapes your brain. Thinking about the future together reshapes society itself. Too many of us think a dystopian future is inevitable. Well, it is if you don’t start thinking positively about a future that you’d actually want to live in. What are some of its aspects? How would we govern ourselves, feed ourselves, what would our dwellings be like, our day-to-day, what tech would we use and what tech would we reject?
The starting-off point is to imagine that we collectively own all the capital the billionaires used to hoard: the technology, the facilities, the means of production, all in our hands. How would we ensure that we don’t replicate their greed, their systems of tyranny and oppression, their violence?
None of us has *the* answer, but we together can come up with it. We all have part of the answer, however small. Therefore it makes sense for us all to contribute some brain processing to bring about our preferred outcome. Think of it as a get-collectively-rich scheme.
I usually eschew posting plugs for anything, but the substance of this post is extremely salient to this account’s objectives. Each of these five points aren’t necessarily sequential, linear prerequisites for the next point—any effort toward one no matter where it is on the list is worthwhile.